The President of the Indigenous Igbo Youths Congress (IIYC), Chief Mayor Echefu has appealed to President Bola Tinubu to exhibit the values of fairness and justice by releasing, without delay, the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu.
While calling on the Federal Government to address the excruciating hunger in the country, Echefu stated that insecurity has contributed greatly to the unpalatable situation people are facing. He called on the authorities to live up to their responsibilities to arrest the situation.
In an interview with VINCENT KALU, the IIYC leader condemned the call by some Yoruba groups for the Igbo to leave Lagos, just as he insisted that the . What is your view on the state of the nation?
It is very frightening. We are in trouble. We haven’t had it so bad in a long time. Nigerians are passing through excruciating anguish. We have never witnessed such a situation in the country. It appears that things are getting worse every day for the common person in Nigeria, particularly in the area of daily survival. It is a reality that several families are in distress today; families that used to live normal life.
It is very difficult for them today to meet up with their daily requirements of household in terms of feeding, in terms of meeting up with transportation to pursue daily endeavours of life, in terms of school fees and house rent. Generally, there is suffering in the land. There is high cost of living; high cost of food just tripled since Tinubu got into office. A bag of rice before the coming in of this administration was about N35, 000, but today, it is N85, 000; the price of beans has tripled, so also many food items. Are we talking about the cost of medication?
This is a nation that has approved N70, 000 as a minimum wage for the workers and the salary cannot buy a bag of rice. Transportation may gulp the entire or half of the monthly salary depending on where you are living and your place of work.
The state of the nation is not comfortable at all. The failure of security has also exacerbated and increased the problem of the economy because in the North West, bandits don’t allow the people to go to farm; in the North East, Boko Haram doesn’t permit farmers to go to their farms, while in the North Central and in the south, the fear of Fulani herdsmen keep people away from their farms. If farmers are not allowed to do farming, how do we expect them to produce food?
Insecurity has made interstate travel nightmarish because of kidnapping that has become a honey pot for criminal elements. If the true statistics of kidnapped victims is made available, including school children, the recent abduction of 20 medical students in Benue, it will show that we are not in charge of the territory that we call Nigeria. I pray that the government in their trial by error policies take measures to tackle the security challenges, otherwise it might be catastrophic.
It is glaring to everybody that Nigeria is collapsing. What we are seeing now is no longer leadership. Politicians are using their positions to defraud the citizens. When the people are starving to death, the president is buying a private jet for himself that is almost a trillion naira, buying Escalade vehicle for almost a billion naira, renovating the VP’s house with over N20 billion. That is insensitive. APC is destroying this country. The party took over from former President Jonathan in 2015 when a bag of rice was N10, 000. Former President Buhari left last year when a bag of rice was N35, 000 and today it is N85, 000 under President Tinubu.
You said since President Tinubu came in, everything got worse. But he said he inherited an economy that was on life support. What do you say to this?
The president cannot say that because he has at different times hailed former President Muhammadu Buhari in exalting words for performing creditably well while in office.
He was part and parcel of the same administration. In fact, the current president was referred as the leader of the party in the last administration.
These were the same people who said that Jonathan was clueless and protested when the former president removed fuel subsidy; they protested for days with their Save Nigeria Now group. Now that Nigeria is near comatose, they have all lost their voices and the strength to organise protest, but they were the ones intimidating people who wanted to genuinely exercise their rights to protest over the unbearable hardship in the country. Tinubu with his party contributed to the rot in the country. He never for one day condemned any of Buhari’s policies or acts. His followers in the South West defended all the deeds of Buhari when he was in office. This is where we are now. He said he would continue with his predecessor’s policies and that is exactly what he is doing and taking it to a notch higher by squeezing the people.
It is clear that he didn’t win the election. He only wanted to be the president without a workable blueprint. The INEC and the judiciary denied the man, who has the blueprint on how to reinvent Nigeria to be the president and everyone is suffering it except those in the corridors of power. So, they know how to rig elections, but they don’t know how to lead; they know how to recruit thugs to rig elections, but they don’t know how to recruit the best people into the cabinet to turn around the fortune of the country.
Look at the kind of Senate and the House of Representatives leadership we have today. It is a mere rubber stamp; without a mind of its own. It is pitiful. The president has shown that he is not capable of steering the ship of the nation, and the best for the country is for him to resign.
Many groups, including the caucus of the House of Representatives, traditional have appealed for the release of the IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu, but he is still there. What do you say to that?
I don’t know why they are afraid of Nnamdi Kanu. His offence is that he is asking that his Igbo people should be treated fairly and equally like other people in Nigeria and if they don’t want to give the same equal treatment to his people, it means that the Igbo should be allowed to be on their own.
The IPOB leader is not the first freedom fighter. Sunday Igboho is walking freely. This government was instrumental to his freedom. Sowore was charged for terrorism and this government, through the Attorney General and Minister of Justice entered a nolle prosequi and withdrew the charges and today he is everywhere talking about revolution. What of the Miyetti Allah leader, Abdullahi Bodejo, who was charged for terrorism> He had his charges withdrawn? The government is yet to say why it doesn’t want to release Kanu.
We had hoped that Tinubu would take a different position from Buhari on this issue, but he seems not to be interested in the situation in the South East. They are just pushing Igbo out of Nigeria. Allow the Igbo to go, you refused, and then allow them to stay, and you also refused. What do you want them to do?
Kanu’s release is long overdue, and I’m imploring the president to see the reason to set that young man free. Many prominent Nigerians have appealed to the president to release him; there is no need to keep him in detention.
Tinubu, please, release Nnamdi Kanu, the way you ordered the others to be released, unless he is saying that equals should be treated unequally.
As of today, Igbo are in Nigeria, and so should resist any attacks from anywhere. If they don’t want them to continue to be part of Nigeria, good and fine, they should allow them to go.
Look at how the APC attacked Igbo both in Lagos and in Imo during the last year’s election. In Orlu, Imo State, a Labour Party youth leader, Chinwe Onumaegbu was attacked, up till now, nobody knows where he is. Look at the Eze Igbo of Ajao Estate, Lagos. His offence was warning against the attacks and the destruction of Igbo properties in Lagos during the 2023 elections and he is still in prison, while MC Oluomo, who threatened to annihilate the Igbo in Lagos, is there in Abuja with the president. The likes of Bayo Onanuga, who were promoting hate and incendiary speeches against the Igbo are in the government.
What is your take on the quit notice to Igbo to leave Lagos issued by some Yoruba groups?
Igbo and Yoruba have good relationship. It is the same Yoruba APC that sponsored the attacks on Igbo in the last general election that is behind the quit notice. Igbo are not afraid to leave. Is it not what Nnamdi Kanu is fighting for? If you don’t want us to stay, allow us to go and then you enjoy your Nigeria. Igbo man is free to go anywhere in Nigeria and do his business lawfully until the Nigerian government asks them to go, which would be a welcome development to them.
President Tinubu in his broadcast during the nationwide protest condemned those that are asking others to go and also those embarking on ethnic slurs against other groups. But beside him is one of his media aides, Bayo Onanuga who has been stoking the ember of ethnic hatred against the Igbo race.
Some northern groups said they want to secede from Nigeria. They came up with their flag, coat of arm, national anthem. What is your reaction to this?
It is a welcome development and nobody should stop them. You cannot force people to belong to where they don’t want. Nigeria is a forced marriage. The colonial master cobbled people of diverse cultures, worldviews together and gave them a name and since then it has been contentions here and there. Any group that wants to go should be allowed to do so.
We have already disintegrated. When the APC Yoruba man doesn’t want the Igbo man to vote in Lagos, what do you call that? The leadership of APC in Lagos is responsible for trying to create a bad blood between the Yoruba and his Igbo brother.
So, if northern groups want their Arewa Republic, it is a good development, after all, Sunday Igboho is saying the same thing with their Oduduwa Republic. Nnamdi is saying the same thing, but you are detaining him in spite of courts judgement to free him.
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